Vancouver Schools and Teacher Strikes - what gives?

Originally Posted by texasdiver

I'm a teacher who moved to Vancouver from TX 2 years ago. I'm currently between schools so not involved in this strike directly. But I can give a direct comparison between the two states and how they pay teachers.

Cost of Living? Vancouver is 30-50% higher depending on the item. Housing is at least 50% higher. Food/Gas and everything else is somewhat higher, maybe 10%.

Teacher salaries? I got a small raise (about $5,000) moving from TX to WA for same position/education/years of experience. Actually only about $4000 was actual higher salary in WA because I would have moved up one spot on the schedule in TX anyway with one additional year of experience. This is for a middle class suburban TX school district. Rural districts pay much less.

Health Benefits? Pretty comparable. Both states provide a choice of HMO and PPO options. The cheapest family plans cost about $500-700+ per month out of pocket. I didn't do a really close comparison but there was nothing strikingly different between the two states in terms of health benefits.

Retirement benefits? Both have a traditional pension system. TX has a higher multiplier (2.3%) compared to WA (2%) but the TX pension is not indexed to inflation whereas the WA pension has a COLA so you retire with a 15% higher pension in TX but it never goes up. You start out with a 15% lower initial pension in WA but then it goes up with inflation so it depends how long you live where those two lines cross. TX also doesn't pay into social security for teachers so you have no SS deduction from your paycheck but then you had better save more yourself in a 403(b) plan to make up the difference. Kind of a wash. Any TX teacher putting his/her entire 7.2% SS percentage into a 403(b) plan for the duration of their teaching career will have enough saved to replace SS and then some. WA has a newer pension system they are pushing on new teachers that is basically a 1/2 size pension with a 401(k) type plan attached. I guess it is cheaper for the state so they are pushing it. But as of now teachers still get their choice of which plan to join but then are locked in to one or the other. Retirement rules (when you can retire) were basically the same in both states.

Bottom line? WA teachers are basically getting TX wages to work in a much higher cost of living state and one that claims to value education more. My wife is employed so I don't need to scramble for side gigs to make a living. But I know a bunch of teachers who are constantly scrambling for evening and summer work just to make ends meet. Driving Uber, bartending, test prep tutoring for Kaplan, etc. etc. And a whole lot of them are living in extremely modest circumstances (small apartments on the fringe of town, shared housing, etc.). I knew a lot of young teachers at the low end of the pay scale who could easily buy a modest first home in a nice new subdivision in TX on their teaching salaries. That isn't remotely possible here.

For elementary teachers and art/music type teachers who don't have a lot of private sector options the teachers stick around for the most part even with low pay. But for teachers with science/tech/health care type skills it is difficult to recruit and keep good teachers. Why stick around at a HS teaching coding or nursing when you can double your salary in the private sector?

In any event, Stealth is right. The schools are pretty quiet right now because Administrators have nothing really to do. All the negotiations and decisions are being handled at a higher level than school principals and counselors so they aren't involved in all that. All the normal orientation, registration, and school athletics activities are still all happening so it isn't like the schools are closed. You just have a gauntlet of smiling waving teachers to drive past when you enter the school parking lot.

If I had to guess, they will reach some final agreement by Friday evening which will end up killing the 3-day memorial day weekend for teachers who will all feel compelled to get back into their classrooms over the weekend to get ready for Tuesday a.m. school start. But I don't know anything other than what I read in the news.